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No Wimbledon Wild Card for Sharapova

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As the 15-month ban which has made Maria Sharapova to drop in world tennis ranking continue to take its toll on the former Wimbledon champion, she said she will not request a wild card for this year’s edition.

The period of inactivity took a toll in her ranking to the point that she does not have enough ranting for direct entry to the main draw. The same thing happened to her entry for the French Open which denied her a wild card.

According to Reuters, the 30-year old remarked on her website she would play in the qualifying event staged the week before.

“Because of my improved ranking after the first three tournaments of my return, I will also be playing the qualifying of Wimbledon in Roehampton, and will not be requesting a wildcard.”

The 2004 champion is ranked 211, below the cut-off for direct entry, although her first-round win at this week’s Italian Open means she is assured a place in the qualifying tournament played a few miles away from Wimbledon.

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Wimbledon’s wildcard committee, which meets on June 20, could have granted a wildcard to the former world number one.

Sharapova would have needed to reach the semi-finals in Rome to climb high enough to gain a spot in the main Wimbledon draw, but she withdrew during her second round match against Mirjana Lucic-Baroni after injuring her left hamstring.

On Tuesday, two-times French Open champion Sharapova was unexpectedly snubbed by organisers who decided against giving her a wildcard into the main draw or the qualifying event of this year’s tournament, which begins on May 28

Kunle Solaja is the author of landmark books on sports and journalism as well as being a multiple award-winning journalist and editor of long standing. He is easily Nigeria’s foremost soccer diarist and Africa's most capped FIFA World Cup journalist, having attended all FIFA World Cup finals from Italia ’90 to Qatar 2022. He was honoured at the Qatar 2022 World Cup by FIFA and AIPS.

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